Breaking the Shackles: Côte d'Ivoire struggles against neocolonialism

The Western media has portrayed the strife as religion-based, pitting the predominantly Muslim north against the south’s Christian and traditional religions.

“Look,” Diagou said, “I’m the mayor of Cocody, a city of about 400,000 people located in the south. There are 49 members of the city council and 22 of them are from the north. We have all religions represented on the council and we get along fine.”

Something else is at work, he said. “The French are using the strategy of divide and conquer to maintain their hold on us.”

Diagou and three other elected officials — two of them women — from Côte d’Ivoire (formerly known as the Ivory Coast) spoke to the PWW during the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Jan. 29.

Making headlines
Côte d’Ivoire was thrust into the spotlight last November, when huge demonstrations erupted in the nation’s administrative center, Abidjan, in the wake of France’s destruction of the country’s fledgling air force. That air strike was in retaliation, French officials said, for an Ivorian bombing of a northern rebel stronghold a few days before in which nine French soldiers, ostensibly “peacekeepers,” were killed.

The Ivorian government said the loss of life was unintended, that its real target was a stockpile of rebel armaments. Rebel forces in the north have been fighting the government for more than two years, resulting in many Ivorian deaths and large economic losses. Many in Côte d’Ivoire see the French as backing the rebels.

As anti-France demonstrations in Abidjan grew in intensity and scope, the headlines in the Western media were sensational, conjuring up the worst imagery of rampaging Africans. French politicians raged against the rebellious Ivorians. The anti-African racism was thick.

In a critical confrontation, French troops opened fire on the demonstrators, killing at least 60 Ivorians and injuring over 1,000 others. Commentators spoke of a “Franco-Ivorian war.” Amidst the escalating tensions, 8,000 expatriates, most of them French nationals, left the country.

Read More (with photos)
http://pww.org/article/articleview/6741/1/261/